Africa-Press – Tanzania. Dar es Salaam.
Tanzania has recorded a shift in employment patterns which experts attribute to diversification of economic activities.
Agriculture is still the biggest employer in the country, but its share of national employment is declining, while other economic activities are rising.
According to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the share of employment in agriculture, forestry and fishing decreased from 66.2 percent in 2014 to 61.1 percent in 2020/21, while manufacturing increased its share from 6.7 percent to eight percent.
Services sector
NBS says in its Integrated Labour Force Survey for 2020/21 report that employment in services increased from 27.1 percent in 2014 to 30.9 percent in 2020/21.
“The decrease in the share of employment in agriculture and increase in manufacturing and services indicate big structural change in the economy, which is a good sign of economic transformation,” the report says.
“When the proportion of labour employed in agriculture decreased and those in other sectors notably manufacturing and services increase, it implies that agriculture sector is served by lesser labour force with increased productivity. This shift also indicates that industrialization agenda is bearing fruits while labour force skills are improving to be absorbed into manufacturing and service sectors as these sectors require high skilled labour force.”
Economists consider countries with economies centred on the services sector as more advanced than industrial or agricultural economies.
The report also indicates that the general unemployment rate has declined from 10.5 percent in 2014 to 9.3 percent in 2020/21.
Speaking to The Citizen in separate interviews, economic experts said shifting employment patterns are a positive sign that economic transformation is taking place in Tanzania.
A University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM) economist, Dr Abel Kinyondo, said the decrease in the number of people involved in agriculture is a positive sign that the country is transforming economically.
“My problem is that the percentage is small. The majority of people involved in agriculture are underemployed, and if productivity was high, they would be in other sectors. However, this shows that economic transformation is taking place gradually,” he said.
Highly productive sectors
Dr Kinyondo noted that if other areas such as mining, manufacturing, telecommunications and startups expand, more people would move from agriculture to highly productive sectors.
“If the blueprint comes into effect, better opportunities would automatically be available for the people,” he said.
Prof Semboja Haji of the State University of Zanzibar said trends in developed countries showed that people were shifting from agriculture to other more productive sectors.
He said the NBS data is an indication that people in agriculture are looking for greener pastures because the sector’s contribution to GDP had also dropped to 29 percent.
“This trend of both the number of people in agriculture and contribution to GDP dropping cannot be attributed to farmers using tractors or irrigation. It’s simply people choosing to move to sectors such as services and manufacturing that pay better,” he said.
Prof Haji noted that economic transformation needs stable systems, including conducive policies, laws and regulations.”
A independent analyst, Mr Christopher Makombe, said there has been a worldwide shift in economic production from agriculture to the manufacturing and services sectors.
“This is because the increase in the use of technology in agriculture has increased productivity, thus reducing demand for labour in the sector,” he said.
According to him, the government’s decision to increase spending in sectors such as health and education has pushed up demand for labour in those areas.
Mr Audax Rukonge, executive director of the Agricultural Non-State Actors Forum (Ansaf), said it was risky for other areas such as the services sector to draw labour at a rapid rate when their contribution to GDP was relatively small.
“People are moving out of agriculture to work in mobile money transfer, bodaboda, hotel and tourism businesses, which is very risky for the economy,” he said.
Mr Rukonge noted that it was imperative to strengthen productivity in sectors that were the mainstay of the economy.
Rural residents
He noted that agriculture will continue to suffer in the future because many rural residents are selling land to people in urban areas who use it for other purposes instead of farming.
“Looking at the manufacturing sector, while it may have more workers, they are just ordinary people working as labourers, which means that productivity is unlikely to increase,” he said.
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